Generating Fear as a Political Tactic

In a recent post, Robert Reich suggested that the true danger of Trump is that hate is his signature language. While I respect Reich’s take and agree that there is abundant spewing of hate by T and his running mate and closest advisors, I think something else is going on as a result of T’s rhetoric.

I think T and V’s motivation (by design I assume) is to invoke fear. The point is that these candidates incite fear at every turn: people will be shot, pets will be eaten, babies will be killed after birth, WWIII will be started. The list is endless.

If one scares people, the response is to take steps to avoid the fearful and rather than attacking the false fear mongers, folks side with T and V as the “fear saviors.” In other words, T and V are saying, “we will save you from all the disasters you fear.” What is missing in the equation is that they are the generators of the very fear that they will save us from.

Now, T and V are generating fear and are getting what they want: a scared populous who believes them. Their approach works well for many because we don’t know how to manage fear and we are afraid that T might be right even if he isn’t. He preys on our concerns — - the trouble we are experiencing in a volatile, chaotic, uncertain and anxiety filled world (which he is exacerbating).

Fear is, sadly, a good tactic. Who wants to live scared? The real issue is how to stop fear mongering before the fear-skewers become the leaders of the free world. Stopping the spewing of hate would be good. Stopping the spewing of fear is a necessity.